I meant to say this the other day, but I think where Marx gets questionable for me is when the transition to *Marxism* occurs, and his corpus becomes this almost scriptural source of various systems of political philosophy and critical theory. I sometimes got the impression when I was much closer to the left in the 2010s that a lot of the bright Young left leaning people I was around, hadn’t really thought through the 20th century and the failure of Leninism in terms more sophisticated than “the bad guys won” though whether that meant “Stalin” or “the United States” varied in the telling….
I ended up thinking that what did it for them, and might theoretically have done it for me in a parallel timeline, was an encounter with one of his texts in a really good college or grad school class.
That’s not a knock. Some texts need to be encountered within that kind of intensive, guided experience to really influence you.
What I probably really need to do is read some of his heirs who write in ways that are more appealing to me. Not that I’m likely to be convinced, but I wouldn’t be surprised if at least a few of his insights I found persuasive or useful.
It's a great time to read Habermas! I'm just wrapping up the third volume of his final work 'Also a History of Philosophy' - not especially illuminating on the matter of Marx, but some insights into how Habermas views his legacy in the cultural critique of the Frankfurt School, and his own reflections on the significance of Marx for the post-Hegelian realization of 'postmetaphysical thinking' in the philosophical discourse of modernity.
At any rate, I'm halfway through Jonathan Sperber's intelectual history, 'Karl Marx', and I can't recommend it highly enough. Kolakowski's 'Main Currents of Marxism' is a magisterial work, though missing many of the later 20th century figures who carry on Marx's legacy in a various forms. And, one more in defense of Marx, by one of my favorite writers, Terry Eagelton, 'Why Marx was Right'. Eagleton is a such a fantastic writer I can forgive his religious devotion to Marx. Eagleton's version presents a kind of watered down 'secular humanist' with an "enormous admiration for capitalism".
In the end, I can't help but see the Marx as a kind of religious and cultic figure, a source of deep-seated Rabbinical instincts - one must always return to the source for revelation, for insights not yet mined, for prophecy, for a renewal of meaning. That his economic theories are a vipers nest of fallacies, and pathological resentments masquerading as science of history, has not and will not deter the faithful.
Thank you for this revealing interview. It's all there.
Listening to this podcast reminds me of why I find Marxists to be so deeply confused and often coming from a place of disaffection and, yes, naive disappointment. The idea that Marx creates a path to freedom from “unfreedom” is so laughable that it is hard to take the discussion seriously.
Ultimately the process of adhering to full Marxism requires subjugation of the self to the socialist state, the destruction of the market economy, and then one must work for the socialist state with no other options. And this is freedom?
And then how do we escape the socialist state into some mystical state of Marxist freedom? It's never stated by Marx or anyone else. The totalitarian socialist state just somehow magically withers away. The revolution creates a totalitarian socialist state that is then supposed to dismantle itself. It's beyond absurd, and the idea that having to work is some kind of state of unfreedom is also laughable. Have either of these guys heard of the subjective theory of value?
Do people expect to do whatever they want whenever they want and not have to earn their keep? I certainly wouldn't teach my children that. Is that freedom or is that delusion? It's a kind of foolish indulgence that's hard to imagine. That somehow the world should just come to them with a cornucopia of gifts on a plate.
The path to freedom has already been given to them and they don't see it. They can do what they want. They can go on a podcast and spout about Marx. They can quit their job. They can go back to school. They can go to art school. They can learn a new sport. They can walk through the hills. They can learn to stand on their head. There's nothing stopping these people from doing just about whatever they want.
It's the disaffected lack of imagination that creates an attraction to Marxism. I could go on and on, but the one thing that struck me the most is how they were indoctrinated into the idea through Marxist professors in the educational institutions. Each one of them explains how they were introduced to Marxism through Marxist professors without being introduced to alternative ideas such as those of Berlin or Hayek or Mises. It's a joke really. They don't realize how they were led, yes led to a system that gives balm to their middle class disaffection and creates the illusion of a path towards some kind of nirvana through Marxism. It's really inexplicable.
great interview. i think chris cutrone would be a good guest for this sort of discussion.
I meant to say this the other day, but I think where Marx gets questionable for me is when the transition to *Marxism* occurs, and his corpus becomes this almost scriptural source of various systems of political philosophy and critical theory. I sometimes got the impression when I was much closer to the left in the 2010s that a lot of the bright Young left leaning people I was around, hadn’t really thought through the 20th century and the failure of Leninism in terms more sophisticated than “the bad guys won” though whether that meant “Stalin” or “the United States” varied in the telling….
This really didn't win me over to the Marx cult
I ended up thinking that what did it for them, and might theoretically have done it for me in a parallel timeline, was an encounter with one of his texts in a really good college or grad school class.
That’s not a knock. Some texts need to be encountered within that kind of intensive, guided experience to really influence you.
What I probably really need to do is read some of his heirs who write in ways that are more appealing to me. Not that I’m likely to be convinced, but I wouldn’t be surprised if at least a few of his insights I found persuasive or useful.
It's a great time to read Habermas! I'm just wrapping up the third volume of his final work 'Also a History of Philosophy' - not especially illuminating on the matter of Marx, but some insights into how Habermas views his legacy in the cultural critique of the Frankfurt School, and his own reflections on the significance of Marx for the post-Hegelian realization of 'postmetaphysical thinking' in the philosophical discourse of modernity.
At any rate, I'm halfway through Jonathan Sperber's intelectual history, 'Karl Marx', and I can't recommend it highly enough. Kolakowski's 'Main Currents of Marxism' is a magisterial work, though missing many of the later 20th century figures who carry on Marx's legacy in a various forms. And, one more in defense of Marx, by one of my favorite writers, Terry Eagelton, 'Why Marx was Right'. Eagleton is a such a fantastic writer I can forgive his religious devotion to Marx. Eagleton's version presents a kind of watered down 'secular humanist' with an "enormous admiration for capitalism".
In the end, I can't help but see the Marx as a kind of religious and cultic figure, a source of deep-seated Rabbinical instincts - one must always return to the source for revelation, for insights not yet mined, for prophecy, for a renewal of meaning. That his economic theories are a vipers nest of fallacies, and pathological resentments masquerading as science of history, has not and will not deter the faithful.
Thank you for this revealing interview. It's all there.
Listening to this podcast reminds me of why I find Marxists to be so deeply confused and often coming from a place of disaffection and, yes, naive disappointment. The idea that Marx creates a path to freedom from “unfreedom” is so laughable that it is hard to take the discussion seriously.
Ultimately the process of adhering to full Marxism requires subjugation of the self to the socialist state, the destruction of the market economy, and then one must work for the socialist state with no other options. And this is freedom?
And then how do we escape the socialist state into some mystical state of Marxist freedom? It's never stated by Marx or anyone else. The totalitarian socialist state just somehow magically withers away. The revolution creates a totalitarian socialist state that is then supposed to dismantle itself. It's beyond absurd, and the idea that having to work is some kind of state of unfreedom is also laughable. Have either of these guys heard of the subjective theory of value?
Do people expect to do whatever they want whenever they want and not have to earn their keep? I certainly wouldn't teach my children that. Is that freedom or is that delusion? It's a kind of foolish indulgence that's hard to imagine. That somehow the world should just come to them with a cornucopia of gifts on a plate.
The path to freedom has already been given to them and they don't see it. They can do what they want. They can go on a podcast and spout about Marx. They can quit their job. They can go back to school. They can go to art school. They can learn a new sport. They can walk through the hills. They can learn to stand on their head. There's nothing stopping these people from doing just about whatever they want.
It's the disaffected lack of imagination that creates an attraction to Marxism. I could go on and on, but the one thing that struck me the most is how they were indoctrinated into the idea through Marxist professors in the educational institutions. Each one of them explains how they were introduced to Marxism through Marxist professors without being introduced to alternative ideas such as those of Berlin or Hayek or Mises. It's a joke really. They don't realize how they were led, yes led to a system that gives balm to their middle class disaffection and creates the illusion of a path towards some kind of nirvana through Marxism. It's really inexplicable.